


Boy versus Soldier

by spectaculacularsammy



Series: Ficlets, Plaid, and Pie, OH My! [3]
Category: Supernatural
Genre: Awesome Bobby, Gen, Teen Dean Winchester, Teen Sam Winchester, the boys get a day off
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-01-02
Updated: 2015-01-02
Packaged: 2018-03-05 00:09:10
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 949
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3097652
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/spectaculacularsammy/pseuds/spectaculacularsammy
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Bobby getting a free day doesn't happen very often, but when it does, he lets his boys just be boys.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Boy versus Soldier

It doesn’t happen very often, but sometimes the phones on the wall of Bobby’s kitchen don’t ring off the hook. Some days there’s no one in the whole damn world who needs him to dig up some lore or find he closest antique store that carries a random hoodoo relic for killing some nameless monster.

Today is one of those days.

“Sam! Dean!” Bobby yells from his office at the fourteen and the eighteen year-old boys sitting on his ratty old couch, cleaning guns that they should be too young to shoot, let alone own.

He watches with an ache in his heart when the two boys put down the guns the instant Bobby calls for them and hustle into his office. Boys their age aren’t supposed to listen, but these boys do. Soldiers are trained to follow orders.

When Sam and Dean line up, side by side, in front of his desk, Bobby grins at them. “Get those boots off and find yourself a pair of sneakers. Bus leaves in fifteen minutes.”

“Yes, sir,” the brothers echo with solider stiff and straight backs that even the military would be proud of.

After the boys run upstairs to follow his order to the letter, Bobby grabs the Wal-mart bag out from under his desk. It’s packed with florescent beach towels, sunblock, and two pairs of red sticker clearance swim trunks.

Bobby’s taking his boys to the beach today, he’s leaving the soldiers behind… or at least he’s gonna try.

He glares at the four phones on his wall and whispers, “And you four’ll keep your traps shut if you know what’s good for you. You can ring your damn heads off all you want tomorrow, but today… today is about those boys; no soldiers allowed."

-

Sam and Dean change in the little shack on the sandy beach, while Bobby sets his rickety old beach chair in the sand and pulls his cap further down his eyes to block out the sun.

The beach is empty of people; it’s almost Dog Days, but Bobby doesn’t care and neither do Sam and Dean, who come barreling out of the shack calling each other ‘jerk’ and ‘bitch’ just like they always do.

Bobby stretches his feet out in front of him and watches Dean throw Sam over his shoulder, who laughs and kicks and yells, while his big brother trudges through the sand to the water.

“De!” Sam laughs. “Fine! I’ll go in! Just don’t throw me!”

“Not gonna throw you in, Sammy.”

Bobby watches Dean set Sam down on his feet and carefully wipe the sand from his cheek. The brothers share a smirk, and Sam gets distracted by a handful of snail shells that have washed up on the shore, while Dean wanders off just a couple feet from Sam, and watches the minnows swim in the reeds.

The clunky phone rings in Bobby’s pocket, and he growls under his breath. He hates that Dean sees, how the boy smile on Dean’s face fades, and the solider shows through just a little bit when Bobby pulls the phone out of his pocket.

“Yeah?” Bobby snaps into the phone while watching Dean look at Sam.

“Been callin’ you all day, Bobby! No one’s answerin’ your phones!” John yells in his ear and Bobby has to move the phone away.

“Nope. Not at home. Target practicing with the boys. Probably won’t be back for a couple hours. When do you think you’ll be at the house?”

“Have the boys ready for me at six. Found a case in New Mexico. Six o’clock.”

“Fine.”

Bobby looks at his watch. It’s 12:24; almost five hours at the beach should be plenty of time for two young boys to have fun. Except Bobby knows it’s not even close to enough time; the world owes these boys more than five hours.

Dean mouths to Bobby, _We gotta go?_

Bobby smiles and shakes his head. Dean grins, and Bobby lets out a sigh of relief when he sees the soldier goes back into hiding.

Bobby tips back his beer.

For five hours Bobby sits in his trucker cap, jeans, flannel shirt, and boots and watches Sam and Dean splash, and hoot and holler at each other. They climb up on the raft and do boy things, like try to make the biggest splash when they do a cannon ball or see who can do the best back flip.

 _This is how they should look, like a couple kids, like boys_ , Bobby thinks to himself, _not soldiers._

When five o’clock rolls around, a pink shouldered Dean leads a brown and tan skinned Sam out of the water and up the beach. They wrap themselves in the brightly colored beach towels, and Bobby can see the soldiers peeking out. Dean didn’t tell Sam that John was coming back; he didn’t have to. Sam has always been able read Dean like an open book; Sam just _knows_. Soldiers always do.

Somberly the two boys walk through the sand, back up the hill to the shack, and five minutes later they come out in jeans and button up shirts; the soldiers are back. His two sunny and smiling boys are left behind in the beach shack, and Bobby knows he won’t see them again for a long time.

-

It’s three minutes after six, and the Impala kicks up a cloud of dust when it drives down the driveway, away from Singer Salvage.

Bobby can still smell lake water and sunblock, but he knows the next time his boys come back, the next time they come _home_ , there’ll be just a bit more soldier in them and a little less boy.


End file.
